Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, and Happy New Year to everyone! 2017 was a big year for Aarica and I (and Emmett too, of course). We worked hard to develop our relationship, our education, and our careers, made some big steps in each of these areas, and built on some of the goals we set out for ourselves in 2016.

Or rather, Aarica and I did those things–Emmett played with hair ties, chased mice (computer mice, that is, not real mice), and meowed a lot.

I did not write a Christmas letter at the end of last year, but I did write a blog post about some of the biggest things that happened to our new family. Last year, Aarica and I celebrated our one year anniversary since we met; Aarica received her Bachelor's Degree in English from the University of Northern Colorado in Greeley, was promoted to the position of Site Director at ABC Child Development Center, and picked up a job at Butters Daytime Eatery; and I started studying Ruby and JavaScript software development at an online coding bootcamp called Bloc, was promoted to full-time as a Retail Sales Associate at T-Mobile, and picked up work as an intern at the Colorado State Senate and as a driver for Lyft.

Most importantly, though, Aarica's parents gave me permission to ask Aarica to marry me, and she said yes on New Year's Eve!

So this year, we built on these things. Over the summer, Aarica began working on her Master's Degree in Elementary Education at UNC and finished her practicum observing other teachers in Greeley's school district. This means that she will be student teaching at High Plains School in Loveland next semester, have her Master’s Degree this summer, and start teaching next fall! She has continued to work at ABC throughout the year and worked part time at Portrait Innovations and American Eagle on weekends.

I am in the final weeks of my Bloc Software Developer Bootcamp. When I submit my open-source project, I will officially be done with the course at the end of this year! I continued to work at T-Mobile throughout 2017, where my title was changed to “Mobile Expert,” and did some Lyft driving on the side. Fortunately, all the coding at Bloc has paid off–just a couple of weeks ago, I was hired as a part time Software Developer at Radial Development Group in Loveland, a consultancy that works with small businesses to build and maintain websites and apps. Radial is a great, supportive team and I have loved working there so far!

Aarica and I have really enjoyed this first year of our engagement, and now two and a half years of our relationship. We moved in together in an apartment in Loveland earlier this year, and wisely chose one with a spare bedroom that has since become my sister Meghan’s room. It really feels like home now, even to Emmett, who was terrified when we moved him here.

Over the summer, Aarica got the opportunity to go to Japan to visit her parents and brother, who are living there for her dad’s work promotion, and came back very tired from jet lag but with a new appreciation for ramen that we are still trying to satisfy. Right around that time, I hiked Grey Rock, puzzled out an escape room, ate ice cream, and played Mario Kart with Nathan, Ryan, Trevor, and Mr. Liston for Nathan’s bachelor party. We took two separate wedding road trips this summer–one to Iowa for Nathan and Kat Liston’s wedding (I was best man!), and one to Jacob and Meagan Walker’s wedding. We hope everyone won’t be all wedding-ed out by the time ours rolls around!

Speaking of which, we picked our wedding venue: Wedgewood Tapestry House in Laporte, Colorado! We can't wait for that day–so much so that Aarica seems strangely excited when we simplify things and refer to ourselves as "Dan and Aarica Rice" on something mundane like the internet bill.

Those are all the big things, I think, but there are also lots of little things. Aarica and I stuck to our tradition of seeing the latest Pixar movies each summer and fall, which means we managed to stomach Cars 3 and tried not to cry like babies at the end of the masterpiece that is Coco. We also decided to start adding Pixar ornaments to our new Christmas tree every year, beginning with the movie we saw on our first date, Inside Out.

Just to make sure that no one doubted our nerdiness, we kept up with all the latest Avengers and Star Wars movies, played lots of Mario together, binge-watched several Netflix shows, and explored Zelda: Breath of the Wild for untold hours.

We watched all of the Northern Colorado fireworks from Horsetooth for a second year in a row together, got a beautiful Fracture print of a picture taken of us at Nathan and Kat’s wedding, and I did my duty as a fiancé to keep Aarica happy–which mainly means keeping her warm via blanket or fireplace and getting her lots of pancakes, chicken wings, and ice cream. I have so far avoided burning down the apartment each time I have made pumpkin pancakes, which, I’ve just realized, is one of the bigger accomplishments in this letter after all. I’ve gotten to be spoiled by Aarica’s fantastic mustard pork and beef stroganoff recipes all year, so fortunately my attempts at pumpkin pancake production remain few and far between.

And I get Aarica flowers every month at the anniversary of the day we met, because boy am I lucky to have her.

We learned a lot. We worked hard. And we had a lot of fun. We love all of our family and friends and wish everyone a happy and safe holiday!